Electronic mail messages are a convenient way of communicating. Often, an electronic mail message is sent for a situation where some activity should take place thereafter. For example, the sender may expect that the recipient will take some action as a result of receiving the electronic mail message, such as sending a reply electronic mail message or performing some other task. As another example, the sender may be expected to take some action as a result of having sent the electronic mail message, such as sending an electronic mail message that specifically states that the sender will do something on behalf of the recipient.
Conventionally, there is no manner of selecting that the electronic mail message, while being prepared by the sender, be tracked in order to provide notifications to the sender that remind the sender to follow-up on the electronic mail message. For users of the OUTLOOK® 2003 electronic mail message program by Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash., senders can set follow-up flags for recipients but not for themselves when composing an electronic mail message. To set a follow-up flag for themselves, the senders have resorted to taking additional avenues, such as manually setting up a specific task entry, copying oneself on the sent electronic mail message and then flagging the received electronic mail message in the Inbox folder, or moving a stored copy of the sent electronic mail message which currently surfaces within the Sent Items folder so as to have it surface within the Inbox folder and then flagging the moved electronic mail message in the Inbox. Thus, the user must take steps beyond composing and sending the electronic mail message in order to manually create a way to be notified about following up.